A Past Life
by alyssialui
Summary: After the Battle, Harry decides to revisit Number Four Privet Drive.


_A/N: After the Battle, Harry decides to revisit Number Four Privet Drive. This could be a sequel to **His Seventh Birthday**._

_Submission for:_

_**Hogwarts School of Witchcraft &amp; Wizardry (Challenges &amp; Assignments): **Charms Assignment #9 - Write about somebody embracing a change_

_Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter._

* * *

Harry stepped towards the door as Hermione, Ron and Ginny stood on the sidewalk. They all looked up at the small little house of Number Four Privet Drive, Little Whinging. Since Harry and the Dursleys had left more than a year ago, the house had fallen into ruin. It was devoid of all colour as all the flowers had died and the paint had started to fade and peel. The yard which Harry had painstakingly cared for since he was six was now high and touching the little empty broken window-boxes, a small sign was posted with the words "FOR SALE".

"Alohomora," Harry whispered as he pointed his wand at the doorknob and heard a soft click in response. Then he signalled to his friends to follow him inside as he stepped in.

Everything was gone: the appliances in the kitchen, the table, the glass cabinet, the little table in the hallway and the pictures of the Dursleys. Harry stepped forward, not really hearing his friends enter behind him.

They began to move past him. Ron had gone straight to the kitchen, Ginny had decided to walk to the living room and Hermione had her hand on the banister to go upstairs but Harry really had just one place he wanted to see.

"Is that it?" a voice asked. He looked up and saw Hermione half-way up the stairs, leaning down over the railing. Ron and Ginny peaked their heads back into the hall to find out what he had found.

Harry just nodded and pulled the little latch at the top, the same latch the Dursley would lock every night from the outside to stop him from walking around in the middle of the night to make a mess or visit the fridge. He pulled it out towards him and his friends peaked their heads around his shoulder, a small gasp escaping Hermione's lips upon seeing the small space he called 'home' for eleven years.

It was empty now, the cot he used to sleep on removed since he was moved into the second bedroom before his First Year. There were many cobwebs hanging from ceiling, with a few spiders still making their homes between the corners and the lone light socket. Ron jumped back a bit when Harry brushed the spiders away.

He turned towards the three shelves that used to lie above his head, the lowest one where he would knock his head on in the night upon waking up from a nightmare. There had been so many little things Harry had collected or stolen from Dudley upon their surfaces, but now all it collected was dust.

"Those Muggles," Ginny said quietly as she took his hand in hers and gave it small squeeze. He could feel that her anger simmering under the surface but wouldn't let it show. She wanted to be there with him as he revisited his past and got whatever closure he needed.

But did he really need it? Harry thought he would feel something when he came here: anger, sadness, regret, but he found he felt nothing. It felt almost as if he were just looking at the shell of something, the shell of his past life long forgotten, for the things that had been a part of it had left.

But then he paused. There was something small up in the dusty corner of the space against the wall. Harry took his hand from Ginny's and stooped to pick it up.

It was a small tin soldier, one of the few that Harry had managed to steal from Dudley's set after he had stopped playing with them at six. Most of the blue and red paint had been scratched and faded after fifteen years, but Harry could still recognize it for this one was special. Harry had marked this one with a slight mark across the top of its head. He had come so far from the small scared boy who needed these little toy soldiers to escape reality.

"What's that?" Hermione asked as she walked down the stairs to inspect the object further.

"It's Sir Harry," Harry said softly. "An old friend who helped me get through the horrible nights in here. He was brave and fearless, never backed down from a fight and always won against the evil general."

Hermione and Ginny giggled and Ron smiled. Hermione asked, "Was he what you wanted to be when you grew up, Sir Harry?"

Harry just chuckled and pocketed the treasured little soldier, "He's what I became."


End file.
